(Adds details from complaint, comments, other Libor litigation,case citations, bylines)
By Jonathan Stempel
NEW YORK, Oct 26 (Reuters) - Barclays Plc and UBSAG have agreed to settle U.S. litigation by bondholderswho accused the banks of conspiring with rivals to rig the Liborbenchmark interest rate, lawyers for the plaintiffs said incourt filings on Wednesday.
Terms were not disclosed, and both accords require theapproval of U.S. District Judge Naomi Reice Buchwald inManhattan.
Libor, or the London Interbank Offered Rate, is used to setrates on hundreds of trillions of dollars of transactions,including for credit cards, student loans and mortgages. It iscalculated based on submissions by banks that sit on panels.
But a variety of investors accused Barclays, UBS and 14other banks in private litigation of suppressing Libor before,during and after the 2008 financial crisis to boost earnings ormake their balance sheets look healthier.
Wednesday's accords cover a proposed class of investors whosaid the collusion caused them to receive artificially lowreturns on more than $500 billion of dollar-denominated debtwhose interest payouts were linked to Libor.
Barclays spokesman Andrew Smith and UBS spokeswoman EricaChase declined to comment. Lawyers for the plaintiffs did notimmediately respond to requests for comment.
In June 2012, Barclays reached a $453 million settlement andentered a non-prosecution agreement with global regulators toresolve Libor manipulation charges.
UBS reached a similar $1.5 billion settlement six monthslater, and in May 2015 agreed to pay a $203 million criminalfine for breaching its own non-prosecution agreement.
The case is Gelboim et al v. Credit Suisse Group AG et al,U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, No.12-01025. The main Libor litigation is In re: Libor-BasedFinancial Instruments Antitrust Litigation in the same court,No. 11-md-02262. (Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by JeffreyBenkoe and Diane Craft)
Barclays (BARC)
